


City Of Switched

by DreamAsIRead



Category: Mortal Instruments Series - Cassandra Clare
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, M/M, Other
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-07-20
Updated: 2016-04-22
Packaged: 2018-04-10 07:28:27
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,853
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4382735
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DreamAsIRead/pseuds/DreamAsIRead
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Switched.<br/>Jonathan Fray grows up with no knowledge of the Shadow World, sheltered by an overprotective mother who's lost too much in her life to sacrifice what she assumes to be her only surviving child.<br/>Seraphina Morgenstern is her father's precious  dark angel, bred for greatness, groomed by a manipulative father driven by a thirst for revenge.<br/>Their worlds are about to collide.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

A butterfly flaps its wings. A hundred little decisions to make up a life. One change. One small pause. A different path, and a life is transformed.

  
In a world where Jocelyn Fairchild escaped with her son but left her daughter to the machinations of a madman, the lives of Jonathan Fray and Seraphina Morgenstern turn out very different indeed.

  
****

"Rebecca. Come on. Just one time. Let's just go in here once. How bad could it be?"

  
Rebecca Lewis scowled at her best friend, "Everytime, Jon. Everytime you say that I get flashbacks of blood and fire and despair. You make me feel like a grizzled old war veteran, Fray. But i digress. The point is, you do not have good ideas. All of your ideas are bad."

  
"I think it's a good idea," Simon piped up. Jonathan laughed and held up his hand for a high-five, which Simon dutifully met, "That's the spirit, Simon!"

  
Rebecca glared at her brother, "You're a tagalong, kid. You don't get to have an opinion. Besides, you're fifteen. I'm not taking my underage brother into a nightclub."

  
"You're underage too,"came the petulant answer.

  
"That is precisely the point. We're not going into Pandemonium, Jon. Nope."

  
"Usually,when a character in a movie says something that decisively, the next scene has them immediately going back on their word."

  
"...I regret your existence, Simon Lewis."

Jonathan was having the time of his life. Alright, so maybe he was exaggerating a little. He was still having fun. The thrill of doing something forbidden could always be counted upon to heighten every experience, after all. Simon certainly seemed to have no complaints. He was drinking in the atmosphere of Pandemonium, an aptly named club going by the utter chaos of the dancefloor. Even Rebecca seemed to be enjoying herself.

  
"I'm gonna go get us some drinks,"Jon shouted in her ear, receiving an affirmative nod. "Nothing alcoholic,"she reminded him.  
Jon shrugged. Although he was only 18, he could easily pass for 21. Getting an alcoholic drink wouldn't be a challenge. But tonight wasn't about getting drunk. He was with Rebecca, and she would flay the skin off him if he did anything reckless. Sometimes his best friend was worse than the overprotective mother he had at home.

  
It was as he was waiting by the bar that the other boy caught his eye. He had dyed electric-blue hair that stuck up all over the place in a way that was distinctly appealing to Jonathan, and a lazy smirk. The smirk turned into a sharp-toothed grin when he caught Jon staring at him.

  
Jonathan gave an easygoing smile in return. The other boy lifted the scythe he was carrying- a very realistic looking prop, Jonathan dimly registered, and tapped the door of what had to be a closet, he was standing against. He sent another smouldering look Jon's way, tilting his head slightly in what was clearly an invitation, then disappeared into the closet.

  
Jonathan rolled his eyes and snorted. He wasn't opossed to hookups with hot guys- or girls. But there was no way he was about to jump into a confined space with some stranger he hadn't even exchanged words with. A sexy smile didn't win over everything. And contrary to Rebecca Lewis' belief, Jon did possess self-preservation instincts.

  
He was about to collect the drinks and head back to Rebecca and Simon when a girl, no more than 16 from the looks of it, went into the very same closet Mr Sexy and Dangerous had just disappeared into. Barely ten seconds after she went in, two figures dressed completely in black went in after her.

  
Jonathan stared as the door slowly slid shut behind the two suspicious figures. That made four people going into a closet. Aside from the obvious jokes he could make, there was something highly suspicious about what he'd just seen.

  
Rebecca would have told him to leave it alone. It was none of his business what other people got up to in the back closets of nightclubs. But Jon's mind kept jumping to the girl. She really had looked astonishingly young with her black hair in a ponytail, and wearing a pure white dress.

  
It wouldn't hurt to take a peek. If the girl was in any trouble, he could help. "Damn your hero complex, Jonathan Fray. It's going to get you into deep shit one of these days."

  
The disapproving voice was so distinctly like Rebecca that Jon had to reconfirm his best friend wasn't standing right behind him. She wasn't. But it seemed his internal monologue was adopting some Rebecca Lewis-isms.

  
He set his shoulders and headed for the closet.


	2. Chapter 2

Five seconds after stepping into the dark, musky-smelling closet, Jon was already regretting his decision. It took a few more moments for his eyes to adjust, and when they did, they nearly bugged out of his head.

The space in front of him was completely empty.

"What the-"

A heavy thud had Jon spinning to look to his left where a dark shape had just hit the wall and ricocheted off it to land on the ground.

"Must you be such a brute,"a girl's amused voice was saying. 

Jon blinked. The formerly empty closet was now populated by four people. The one who had spoken was the girl he had seen walk into the closet. She was flanked by two boys. The black-haired one was glaring intently in Jon's direction, and the other, whose blonde hair was so bright it almost seemed to light up the dark closet, was studying his knuckles. 

The first person to disappear into the closet, the boy with the electric-blue hair, who'd  flirted with Jon, turned out to have been the dark shape flung against the wall. He was lying on the floor at Jon's feet.

Before Jon could make a decision to do anything, one of the other boys, the blonde one, fell to one knee and jerked the guy up in a rough movement. His other hand drew out from behind his back, holding a wickedly sharp-looking prop knife. 

Jon watched as he held the knife to the prone boy's throat. Droplets of dark liquid welled up. Not a prop then.

"Give me one good reason why I shouldn't slit your throat right now, demon," the blonde hissed.

"Don't play with it, Jace." The dark-haired boy said in what sounded like an oft-repeated put-upon tone. Huh, he actually sounded a lot like Rebecca.

The blonde boy, Jace, frowned and seemed about to retort, when his prey shifted. "I can give you information."

Jace sneered, "What kind of information would I want from filth like you?"

"Valentine," the boy rasped, "He's alive."

Jace stiffened. The amused smirk on his face vanished, replaced by stormy disgust, "Thats what all of you always say. But Valentine's rotting in hell, where you belong."

"Foolish Shadowhunter. You will regret this."

"Doubt it,"Jace said easily. And then he jerked his arm down in a fluid movement.

Jon jumped back to avoid the spray of fluid, and bit back a scream as he processed what he'd just seen. That boy, Jace, had just slit the throat of the other guy.

He was the witness to a murder! Holy shit. Rebecca was going to freak.

He looked up and locked eyes with the murderer himself. Green eyes looked into curious amber ones, and Jon took a step back. "Fuck."

"Fuck! You just killed that guy. Holy shit. Shit shit shit."

"The mundane can see us?"

Jon's eyes jumped to the one who had spoken, the girl. "What did you just call me?"

"Whoa. He's looking right at me."She had an uncertain smile on her face. "This is weird."

"Izzy," the dark-haired guy started in an admonishing tone. Damn, he really did seem like he'd get along with Rebecca.

"Interesting,"Jace said, not looking away from Jon. "So you can see us, little boy."

Jon squinted at him. "Dude. What the fuck. I'm like, taller than you. If anyone here is a little boy, it's you."

Jace's mouth twisted and the dark-haired boy even let out a little snort that might have been laughter. Oh god, he was bantering with killers and making their accomplices laugh.

"Oh my fucking fuck. You just killed a person and I'm standing here talking. Somebody should call the cops." He paused. "Not me. I'm not calling the cops. Just don't kill me. My mom would be insufferable if I actually got stabbed the one night I sneaked out without telling her."

And now he was rambling to murderers. Fantastic.

"I did not kill a person," Jace looked offended. He pointed at the body and Jon quickly averted his eyes. He had no interest in examining dead bodies. "That was a demon."

"Is that some kind of gang name or something?" Jon frowned. "Are you guys the mob?"

"Oh, by the Angel," Jace groaned. "No, look." He lifted the arm holding the knife and plunged down so quickly that Jon had no time to close his eyes. The knife dug into the body which....exploded into a shower of golden dust. Jon stared. There was no other way to describe it. Where there had been a body only moments ago, there was now only empty ground and the remnants of golden powder.

"Holy shit." Eloquent, if he did say so himself.

The door of the closet was pushed open, letting in an influx of light and sound, "Jonathan Fray, what are you doing hiding in a closet? I almost called the cops looking for you. Your mother called and she would like to know why you are not in your room?! I thought you told me she knew you were coming out tonight!"

"Rebecca!" Jon hissed, waving his hand at the three extremely dangerous criminals standing in the closet with him. He hoped his eyes conveyed the message: _Get the fuck out of here and come back with the cops!_ By the way Rebecca was looking at him, some of that was definitely lost in translation.

"Are you drunk?" she sniffed suspiciously at him. 

Jon jerked away from her, "No! I've been with you the whole night!"

"Except for when you disappeared to hide out in a closet," she huffed. "What about this closet is so transfixing that you are somehow able to ignore the fact that you're probably going to be grounded for the next decade?" Rebecca said exasperatedly, her eyes travelling around the space with a dismissive gaze. Her gaze passed right over Jace, Izzy and the other guy. 

"She can't see us," Jace said helpfully, an infuriatingly satisfied look on his face. Jon glared at him.

"Jon?" Rebecca sounded worried now. "Are you alright? I sent Simon to get a cab. Let's go home. You can rest on the way, okay?"

Jon sent another look at the three, apparently invisible people. "Yeah, okay," he muttered weakly. As he followed Rebecca out of the closet, he couldn't resist looking back. Jace gave him a smart salute as the door closed on the three.

 

**Author's Note:**

> I am a horrible person. Yes, this is Dream As I Read, whose story From the Glass Towers to the Downworld Estate over on Fanfiction.net has not been updated in over a year. And here I am with a new story. No, I haven't abandoned that. Im just having some sort of mental block with that. Trying to write other stuff that will give me inspiration, and i couldn't resist this idea. Hope you like


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